Cancer Screening and Prevention

Cancer screening is carried out to detect a cancer as early as possible in an attempt to provide early and successful treatment. Not all cancers are equally amenable to early detection and treatment. For example, there are few early markers for lung cancer, and it is often detected very late in its course, when treatment is less effective. Prevention is even better than early detection, but the evidence for what may work is drawn from a combination of population studies, basic science studies, and a limited number of human studies. Very few diet and lifestyle interventions are proven to work, but the observation that healthy diet and lifestyle are associated with reduced risk is very strong.

Detection of a cancer often brings with it the next ...